Crested Serpent Eagle - Juvenile

It's always a good thing to have a longer reach when you're shooting wildlife or birds. But, sometimes you find yourselves in a situation where fitting the subject in the frame becomes a big challenge and with fixed lenses it's you who needs to zoom in and out.

Shooting birds isn't an easy job:

- you got to be patient since they can fly and you can't!
- you need to maintain the right distance, too close and you'd have lots of difficulty framing the bird (like in this case)
- you need to figure out which is the best angle for the light and most importantly the background

This is a full-frame shot of this beautiful bird, probably one of three the shots where I could capture it from head to tail and get a decent background too. I wished to get some more space on the top and bottom but a different angle also meant a changed background and even though I do have other shots where the bird is comfortably placed in the frame, the background isn't as contrasty. So even though this is tightly framed, I still picked this one as my favorite from the series.

Shooting from the safari jeep also adds to the complexity as you need to figure out whether shooting handheld is a better deal than using the bean bag since the angles differ significantly. I had to shoot this handheld since the beanbag wasn't really giving me an angle to get the background right.

Tech Specs:
Canon 1D Mark IV + Canon 600mm F4 L IS
Shot at 600mm, 1/800s, F4 and ISO 800

Tridev - The Three Headed Stork!

During my last visit to Kabini earlier in August, I stopped at Ranganathittu for a quick tour of the sanctuary. Knowing that this isnt the season time at Ranganathittu, the expectations weren't very high but I was pleasantly surprised with the Juvenile Painted Storks and the Black Headed Ibises nesting around the islands.

Karnataka Tourism has increased rates for safaris at all their parks and it was no different at Ranganathittu as well. What used to be a 500 per hour boat ride is now 1000 bucks for 30 mins. That's a 4-fold increase in rates which means more money flowing into the forest dept kitty! Anyways, I'm okay to pay the premium as long as they take some steps in maintaining and conserving these places and not just siphoning it into unnamed accounts.

There was a group of Painted Storks on a rock and as the boat passed around the place, a sudden convergence of bodies happened. I started clicking as the boat moved to get a shot that looks like a three headed stork. The result was quite rewarding and a good addition to my avian collection.

Tech Specs
Canon 1D Mark IV + Canon 600mm with 1.4x TC
Shot at 840mm, 1/4000s, f8 and ISO 1600